In a letter to Chairman Mike Simpson and Ranking Member Marcy Kaptur of the House Appropriations Committee Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies, the Georgia congressional delegation recommended that the committee allocate the funding needed to keep the project on time and on budget.

The president requested $50.06 million for SHEP in his fiscal year 2018 budget request. However, according to the Army Corps of Engineers, without annual funding of $80 to $100 million a year the project cannot be completed on time and the resulting delays will cost taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars.

"If the rate of SHEP’s construction were to continue at the rate reflected in the FY 2018 request, the completion of SHEP would be delayed by at least five years. A partially completed channel deepening project provides zero benefits to the nation, and the USACE estimates that a five year delay would by itself add well over $100 million to the project construction cost. Combined with the multi-year loss of the $282 million in annual economic benefits that the completed project will provide, the total cost of under-funding SHEP is a staggering and unrecoverable loss of more than $1 billion," the delegation wrote.

"For that reason, we recommend that in addition to supporting the SHEP budget request of $50.06 million, the Subcommittee include within those funds available under the Subcommittee’s Additional Funding account no less than $100 million designated specifically for construction of deep-draft navigation projects nationwide. As we discuss the bipartisan efforts to overhaul and expand our nation’s transportation networks, deep-draft navigation projects will continue to be a leading opportunity to see significant economic growth."